Sheikh Jarrah controversy

OCHA map of Palestinian communities under threat of eviction in East Jerusalem, as at 2016. Three areas of Sheikh Jarrah are identified: Im Haroun, Karm al-Jaouni and central Sheikh Jarrah.
Checkpoints since 3 May 2021 at Karm Al Jaouni area of Sheikh Jarrah

The Sheikh Jarrah controversy, which has been described as a "property/real estate dispute" by the Israeli government and its supporters,[1] and as an "expulsion", "displacement" or "ethnic cleansing" event and a matter of international law by Palestinians and their supporters,[2][3] is a long-running legal and political dispute between Palestinians and Israelis over the ownership of certain properties and housing units in Sheikh Jarrah, East Jerusalem. The evictions are considered a contributory cause of the 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis.[4][5]

It has been described as a microcosm of the Israeli–Palestinian disputes over land since 1948,[6][7] with academic Kristen Alff noting "To describe dispossessions in Sheikh Jarrah as a "real estate" quarrel conceals the true history of land ownership in the regions – which is complicated, disputed and rarely decided in favor of Palestinians."[8] In East Jerusalem, Israel's laws allow Jews to file claims over property held prior to 1948, but reject Palestinian claims over property that they owned prior to 1948 in Israel proper.[9][10][11] According to Middle East Eye, the dispute is part of the Israeli government's Holy Basin settlement strategy.[12] Aryeh King, a deputy mayor of Jerusalem and one of the founders of the Ma'ale HaZeitim settler compound, told The New York Times that the eviction of Palestinian families was "of course" part of a municipal strategy to create "layers of Jews" throughout East Jerusalem.[13] Many Palestinian families in East Jerusalem have been affected by "forced relocation processes or been involved in lengthy legal procedures to revoke an eviction order".[14]

The property in Sheikh Jarrah in dispute includes the adjacent Shimon HaTzadik/Karm Al-Ja’ouni and Um Haroun (former Nahalat Shimon) compounds to the East and West respectively of the Nablus Road. In the former, the Palestinian residents of Sheikh Jarrah were refugees who received plots of land in a UNRWA lottery, relinquishing in return their refugee documents and accompanying rights. They have no right under Israeli law to repossess their pre-1948 homes in Haifa, Sarafand and Jaffa.[15][16] The Palestinian view is that given Sheikh Jarrah's location beyond the Green Line or Israel proper, Israeli courts have no jurisdiction over land disputes in what is occupied territory according to international law, and that the displacement of people in occupied territory is a war crime under the Rome Statute.[17] The United Nations Human Rights Office has said that as Sheikh Jarrah is in East Jerusalem, which is considered occupied territory, international humanitarian law prohibits the confiscation of private property and evictions of Palestinian families could constitute war crimes.[18]

  1. ^ Hurst, Luke (20 May 2021). "Sheikh Jarrah: Small neighbourhood making big impact in Gaza conflict". Euronews. Archived from the original on 21 May 2021. Retrieved 28 May 2021. What is happening in Sheikh Jarrah has been characterised by the settlers and their supporters as a mere property dispute.
    Lucy Garbett, 'I live in Sheikh Jarrah. For Palestinians, this is not a ‘real estate dispute’ Archived 25 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine The Guardian, 17 May 2021: "There have been many attempts to portray the cases of dispossession in Jerusalem, and Sheikh Jarrah specifically, as isolated, individual incidents, painting them as "real estate disputes" that drag on for years in court. But for Palestinians, Sheikh Jarrah is simply a microcosm of life in Jerusalem. It symbolises the continuing ethnic cleansing of our land and homes."
    Haynes Brown, 'The latest Israel-Palestine crisis isn't a 'real estate dispute'. It's ethnic cleansing', Archived 2 June 2021 at the Wayback Machine MSNBC, 11 May 2021: "Regrettably, the PA" — the Palestinian Authority — "and Palestinian terror groups are presenting a real-estate dispute between private parties, as a nationalistic cause, in order to incite violence in Jerusalem," the ministry said in a statement Saturday, two days after anger in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of east Jerusalem began to boil over. Calling the catalyst of all this a 'real estate dispute' is a particularly noxious way to diminish what's actually occurring: Nahalat Shimon, a U.S.-based settler organization, is trying to have Palestinians who have lived in the neighborhood since 1956 evicted."
    Patrick Kingsley,'Israeli Court Delays Expulsion of Palestinian Families in East Jerusalem,' Archived 9 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine The New York Times, 9 May 2021
  2. ^ Kingsley, Patrick (7 June 2021). "A House Divided: A Palestinian, a Settler and the Struggle for East Jerusalem". The New York Times.
  3. ^ "Evictions in Jerusalem Become Focus of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict". The New York Times. 8 May 2021. Archived from the original on 9 May 2021. Retrieved 28 May 2021.
  4. ^ Kingsley, Patrick (7 May 2021). "Evictions in Jerusalem Become Focus of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict". The New York Times. Jerusalem. Archived from the original on 9 May 2021. Retrieved 9 May 2021.
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference auto was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Seth Frantzman, 9 May 2021, Why the Sheikh Jarrah dispute has captured international attention Archived 10 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine, The Jewish Chronicle
  7. ^ Daventry, Michael (4 August 2021). "Sheikh Jarrah explained: why it's more than just a property dispute". jewishnews.timesofisrael.com. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
  8. ^ Alff, Kristen (14 June 2021). "Property disputes in Israel come with a complicated back story – and tend to end with Palestinian dispossession". The Conversation. Retrieved 7 August 2021.
  9. ^ Jadallah, Dina (15 January 2014). "Colonialist Construction in the Urban Space of Jerusalem". The Middle East Journal. 68 (1): 77–98. doi:10.3751/68.1.14. ISSN 0026-3141. S2CID 144192838.
  10. ^ "What has caused Jerusalem's worst violence in years?". The Guardian. 11 May 2021. Archived from the original on 12 May 2021. Retrieved 15 May 2021. Under Israeli law, Jews who can prove pre-1948 title can claim back their Jerusalem properties. No similar law exists for Palestinians who lost homes in West Jerusalem.
  11. ^ Evan Gottesman, Forward, 10 May 2021, The fights over Sheikh Jarrah reveal the folly of relitigating Israel's founding Archived 12 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine
  12. ^ Sheikh Jarrah explained: The past and present of East Jerusalem neighbourhood Archived 15 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine, Middle East Eye
  13. ^ Evictions in Jerusalem Become Focus of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict Archived 9 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine, 7 May 2021
  14. ^ Meir Margalit (26 July 2018). "9. Silent Forced Migrations in Twenty-First-Century Jerusalem". In Tabea Linhard; Timothy H. Parsons (eds.). Mapping Migration, Identity, and Space. Springer International Publishing. p. 221-. ISBN 978-3-319-77955-3. Archived from the original on 25 May 2021. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
  15. ^ Daphna Golan-Agnon, Teaching Palestine on an Israeli University Campus:Unsettling Denial, Archived 10 July 2021 at the Wayback Machine Anthern Press 2020ISBN 978-1-785-27502-9 p.57.
  16. ^ Cite error: The named reference exchange was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  17. ^ Bacon, Tareq (14 May 2021). "Sheikh Jarrah and After". London Review of Books. Archived from the original on 17 May 2021. Retrieved 17 May 2021.
  18. ^ Magid, Jacob (7 May 2021). "UN: Pending Israeli evictions in East Jerusalem could be a 'war crime'". The Times of Israel. Archived from the original on 24 May 2021. Retrieved 24 May 2021.